


Strung Out and Hung Up on You

by baconbits1760



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Bruises, Everyone Is Alive, Hopper is a dad and no one can stop him, Light Angst, Like super light, M/M, Pining, Post-Canon, Post-Season/Series 03, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Scars, Thanksgiving, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, barely any
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:48:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28163454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/baconbits1760/pseuds/baconbits1760
Summary: By the time Steve realized there was even an issue, it was far too late to fix it. The "problem", as he had been so hesitantly calling him, wore a cold stare and a silver ring on his middle finger.
Relationships: Billy Hargrove/Steve Harrington
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21
Collections: Harringrove Holiday Exchange 2020





	Strung Out and Hung Up on You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hmg621](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hmg621/gifts).



> Hi!!! Merry Christmas/ Happy Holidays y'all!  
> I'm hoping this 8k fic is a good enough gift for the Harringrove Holiday Gift Exchange! I left it a little open-ended since I really didn't want to make it more than 9k words, but I might add another chapter or two for fun eventually!  
> This fic takes place in two Novembers after the 4th of July in Season 3, and everyone who died or is allegedly dead is alive and no one can stop me~  
> Happy Reading!

By the time Steve realized there was even an issue, it was far too late to fix it. The "problem", as he had been so hesitantly calling him, wore a cold stare and a silver ring on his middle finger. 

_The Problem_ was always on time. 

Every single damn day of class, _The Problem_ waltzed in at 9:15, notebook in hand. 

Steve sat exactly two rows and one seat behind _The Problem_ , or ‘Mister Hargrove’ as the professor so adamantly referred to him as. He was far too intelligent to be in a class with Steve, and Steve knew it. 

Seeing him raise a tanned, pencil-clad, hand to almost every question Professor Grimes proposed made something in the back of Steve’s throat tighten up.

Watching those golden curls fall gracefully onto his back, which Steve was certain was perfect beneath the hoodies and sweaters he so often wore, made the sophomore's chest ache in a way he had never experienced.

Truthfully, the burning stares and chewed pencil caps had not been the first sign of trouble. Because he had found himself somehow thinking about the classmate long after the hour was up.

The initial instance of worry had occurred during Fall Break when he had been invited to the Byer's residence for Thanksgiving dinner.

Loud laughter and the clinking of plates and silverware and glasses hardly bothered him the way Thanksgiving with his parents had for so many years. 

The Harrington family had been told that Steve was staying behind in the dorms. That he had "So much work to do." And that "He couldn't afford to come home and risk his GPA."

Joyce hadn't been very pleased, learning of this as she was preparing something doughy and sweet for the festivities dessert table.

"I know you don't like them, Steve, but you could've just told them where you were." 

She pauses her kneading to dust her floured hands on her apron before placing them daintily onto her waist. 

"You should call them-" Steve barely has time to even part his lips in protest before she raises a pointer finger in the direction of the hall, towards the pale yellow rotary phone just barely peeking out from the corner.   
He can feel the dread icing its way into his veins. He’s not sure if it's the thought of speaking to his mother, or the idea that in this one instance, his father may be home. That he may hear his dad’s cold, unfeeling voice answering the phone as if everything’s perfectly fine. As if the last conversation he had had with his son wasn’t the “If you fail, you’re disowned” talk. As if he hadn’t made it perfectly clear that the Harrington parents neither believed in him nor his future or aspirations.   
  


He was in front of the phone before he really even registered that he had walked over to it. It looks nothing like the phone in the dorms or the one he had found under the tree Christmas morning 3 years ago. That phone had been a dial-up, one of the newest models of some brand he couldn’t be bothered to remember. He had asked for a new cassette player, and instead, his mother had bought him this baby blue receiver for his room.

“Thought you may have a need for it since you’ve been talking to that Nancy girl so much.” She had waved her hand over her shoulder as she waltzed back into the kitchen, finishing the bottle of Merlot she had just started 30 minutes ago when they had woken up on Christmas morning.   
  


He had broken up with Nancy nearly two months prior, but at that point, he would rather just swallow the aching in his chest than mention it.   
  
He had barely used the thing before he boxed it back up to send to the dormitories. It was somewhere discarded in the path between his Beemer and the room, or he’d handed it to one of his roommates in some desperate attempt to avoid looking at it.   
Now he was severely disadvantaged as he fumbled to move the rotary dial. He knew he had to stop at certain numbers to dial them. But the 8, 9, and 2 were all jumbled as he tried to focus on what number he was supposed to be dialing.   
He tilted his head and tucked the receiver into the crook of his neck and lifted his shoulder so he could cross his arms as he waited for the ringing to start. Steve couldn’t help but tense when it did, his shoulder scraping against the sharp corner of the boxy plastic casing.

“Hargrove residence-”   
  
Steve’s soul felt like it had left his body entirely. His shoulders stiffened so hard and so fast that the plastic receiver groaned in protest. He felt like his throat was on fire, like if there was a God out there that the guy in the sky had just tossed him to the fucking dogs. 

“Jesus-” He barely managed to choke out before the receiver slipped from its spot on his ear and flung itself towards the linoleum. It slips out of his hands twice on its downward spiral before he manages to finally catch it.   
  


Without thinking, he slams it back onto the hook with a shaking hand. The young man’s voice echoes through his empty head for a moment as he tries to steady his breathing. His stomach and chest suddenly hurt as the blood returned to the places he undoubtedly slammed the phone into before actually managing to catch it.

  
Letting out a quiet groan, he drops his head until it hits the floral-papered wall of the hallway. Wrapping his arms around his middle, he just stands there, letting the heat burn its way through his neck and face before it reaches his ears. Whatever forces were working in the universe seemed to really hate his guts.   
  


“Steve?” 

The voice comes from somewhere in the hallway before reaching the college student. Chief Hopper stares from his spot leaning against the doorframe to the living room, a few cardstock turkey feathers taped haphazardly to his large hand. 

  
It takes a moment before Steve’s voice finds him again, but when it does he almost wishes it hadn’t. “I-” He clears his throat against the voice crack that's erupted from it, biting back an anxious laugh at his own horrible luck. “I don’t think I dialed the uh-” He scratches his head before motioning to the rotary phone helplessly. "right...number.” 

  
Hopper’s face is unreadable for a moment as he surveys the situation, his eyes moving from Steve to the phone, to the doorway of the kitchen, where Joyce is trying to busy herself as though she hadn't been watching this whole time.

He leans a little more heavily into the doorframe, bringing up a thumbprint cookie to his mouth wordlessly.   
He seems to be waiting for more, and Steve feels like the spoonful of mashed potatoes he swiped from the kitchen might make a reappearance. Hopper raises a thick eyebrow to the green working its way up the teenager’s neck, finishing off the last of the cookie in his second bite. 

Steve tries to rub some of the ache out of his arm before awkwardly looking to the phone, and then to his blue and green striped socks that Joyce had insisted on sending him two months prior.

“The numbers are weird on it.” 

Steve finally blurts out before slapping his hands against the sides of his thighs. “I- I just-” He rolls his eyes at the strange shame trying to billow up in his chest. 

  
“Here-” Hopper is suddenly at the phone, using one large hand to push him slightly to the side. He unhooks the receiver, ignoring Steve’s ‘ _No really it’s fine- I don’t need-_ ’ before motioning with his unused hand for Steve to say the number aloud.   
  


Steve manages to stumble through the number, barely stuttering as the loud clicking of the rotary draws his focus away.   
He can hear the phone, which looks tiny in Hopper’s grip, begins to ring. He braces himself for the hasty hand-off. 

  
But Hopper’s voice interrupts his mental psych up. 

  
“Hey, this is Jim Hopper.” His face scrunches subconsciously as he speaks, his eyes moving ever slowly up towards the ceiling as he processes the words he’s hearing. He pulls another thumbprint cookie from a jacket pocket and holds it up to his mouth.   
“No no- Mrs. Harrington, he’s not.” He laughs at this, taking a huge bite before covering his mouth. “Yeah, no- Joyce just wanted to let you know he’s with us tonight, Jonathan invited him over last-minute-” He’s cut off quickly, his brows carving an even deeper space against his features. A quiet huff comes from somewhere beyond Hopper’s lips as he tries to fight a grimace.   
Steve can’t hear exactly what his mother is speaking about, but something about the tone that's leaking through the space between where Hopper’s ear and the phone meet makes his stomach churn. He’s sure she’s not speaking nicely about him.   
  
The tone reminds him of hushed conversations he’d overhear on school nights between his mother and one of his 1000 aunts out in New Jersey or Florida. It was always the same thing, some broken sentence about “Stevie’s grades” being “less impressive than we’d hoped.”   
  
Or some slightly slurred argument in the hallway to the kitchen between his father and her. They had rarely gotten along when he was younger, but the last few years in high school had set the tone for a new kind of malcontent between them. On occasion he’d hear glass shatter against some wall, only to find a new mysterious red wine stain somewhere on the crown molding in the kitchen.   
  


This tone was his least favorite. It was his mother’s favorite to use if she needed to curry favor with some poor unsuspecting family friend who tried to defend her son’s intelligence at a holiday party or some uptown business meeting.  
For a moment he could feel his throat tighten as he desperately watched Hopper for any sign of belief. He knew the process well, a weird look across the dinner table after a word with his mother and suddenly they weren’t as pleasant to speak with.   
But after what feels like an eternity he says some weak excuse, nodding between his _‘Alright, goodbye Mrs. Harrington._ ’ and the ‘ _Mhmm. Okay, I will_ .’   
  


Finally, he sets the receiver back on the hook and turns a bewildered face to Steve. “Jesus, kid you could have at least warned me that they're crazy before you gave me the number.” He ran a crumb covered hand down his face dramatically before grinning at the anxious teen.   
Steve moves to the side before receiving a large-handed clap to the shoulder blade. “Relax kid, she can talk all the shit she wants, she’s never seen ‘yah take out a monster with that bat.” he waggled his eyebrows before moving back into the living room, his presence announced by several kids chanting “Tur-key hand! Tur-key hand!”   
  


Everything felt so much brighter after that moment as if someone else confirming he wasn’t the worst has suddenly brought up the saturation of the whole world. The Byer’s Thanksgiving Dinner was _so much better_ than anything his parents had ever made him attend.   
  
Biting back laughter after El launched a huge spoon of gravy straight into Dustin’s hair didn’t result in being sent to his room early after an earful from his father.

And when Hopper had to lift Dustin up and away from the table after he had launched himself in El’s direction, Steve wasn’t blamed or glared at. In fact, he and Joyce had made eye contact before both bursting into wheezing laughter, which was luckily covered up by the shouts of everyone else at the table.  
  
Leaving Hawkins again after Thanksgiving break had been more difficult than it had ever been in his life. The hugs from everyone didn’t feel as weird or stiffly formal as the ones with his blood relatives. 

And after Hopper had given him the tightest bear hug he’d ever survived, Joyce hastily handed him several meals packed neatly into old Tupperware containers, and stored in cooler bags that had clearly been Jonathan’s old lunch bags.   
Before he could deny any more food, which would take weeks to get through, Hopper called out “Where are the cookies Joyce?” from somewhere in the kitchen. She has a wide grin on her face as she reaches up into her zipped coat and pulls out a huge Tupperware container of assorted cookies. The bottom of the container is still nearly burning as she hands it over, it begins to steam as the cold air reaches it.   
  
He raises his eyebrows in amusement as she calls back to Jim with “I’m not sure, I broke them all up so the kids could take them back with ‘em!” Which elicits a groan from the Sheriff.   
Steve tries to stifle a laugh before setting the container into the back of the beemer. 

Joyce winks at him before stating, “I love the way he’s shaped right now. I’m sure he can survive on the packages of Oreos at the station that he thinks are a secret.”  
  


Steve laughs at this, unbridled and harder than he had in years. “Right, or the donuts he orders on Saturdays.”   
Joyce feigns shock at this, putting a delicate hand to her mouth while gasping loudly.   
“He does _what_?!” She calls out loudly before she breaks, her smile breaking through her fake anger all too quickly. She winks again before reaching out to hug him one last time, rocking him side to side as she squeezes him as tight as she can.   
“We’ll miss you over here, Steve. Feel free to give us or Hop a call if you ever need someone to ya’ know…” She lets go of him, looking him up and down one last time, “Talk or- get a meal, _gosh_ you’re so thin.” She squeezes his cheeks with her hands again as he laughs, heat welling up behind his eyes for a reason he couldn’t really place.  
  
  


The real problem hadn’t been the meal or the goodbyes, or even the call to his parents. It had been the ride back into the city that had changed things.   
He had been driving for only about 15 out of the 135 minutes it would take to get back to campus when he had seen a black shape moving against the snow in the far distance of the road.   
He squints against the bright white of the reflective snow, the figure now coming into focus as he begins to just barely crest the hilltop they are carefully walking down. The blonde curls peeking out of the thick winter hat nearly caused the car to skid on the turn before he managed to get the tires under control.   
Billy Hargrove turns his head to watch his classmate nearly wipeout into the snowbank.  
His face is splotchy and pink from the cold, nearly completely covered by the large, itchy-looking scarf he’s got wrapped and tucked neatly into his coat’s top.   
Steve manages to recover himself in the most awkward way before coming to a slow roll next to him.   
He has to carefully lean most of his body across the passenger side to reach the hand crank, the other hand occupied with keeping the car on the road. The window squeals loudly as it begins its descent, and Steve can feel the heat working its way up the back of his neck.   
“Hey uh-” The window squeaks again as it finally settles into the inside of the door, interrupting him abruptly. He tries his best to keep the screaming in his head from echoing outwardly, a grimace slowly beginning its stubborn path in his lips.   
Billy’s soft lips quirk into a smile but stop suddenly as he puts a hand up quickly to the large cut that seems to have just scabbed over on his bottom lip. One gentle finger grazes over it before coming back coated in a shiny scarlet that begins to bead down the pad and towards where the digit meets his palm. He doesn’t make a sound, which makes something in Steve’s heart hurt in that weird way that it sometimes does.   
“You, uh. We- um, h-have English 101 together I- I think. And uh-” He’s on a real hot streak of not knowing how to speak today. 

Billy raises an eyebrow, continuing to walk in time with the Beemer as it continues its forward crawl. He stuffs his gloved hands deeper into his pockets, scuffing the thick boots his jeans are stuffed into on the snow.   
“I was just- wondering if you’re um-” He takes his hand off the wheel to roll it as if trying to move the words out of his mouth faster.   
“You’re like trying to walk the uh, the whole way there or…” He lets the sentence trail off as he stares at his bundled-up classmate’s bemused expression with panic.   
Billy turns a poorly contained smile towards the sophomore, pausing for what feels like 30 seconds. Steve feels like his whole body is burning and freezing at the same time, waiting in this horrible limbo for this inevitable rejection of his strangely worded invitation for a ride.   
  
Billy’s laugh sends something dropping in his stomach like he’s riding the Spinning Cups at the summer carnival. “Yeah uh, got a ride from a friend down here, left the car up at the dorms.” He waves his gloved hand that seems slightly bulky even for being swathed in the flannel fabric.   
Steve’s nerves seem to fall away as Billy turns away from him for just a moment, the light catches his jawline just right. 

  
It’s a bruise.   
  


A deep brownish-purple that stretches from the curve of his jaw to the spot right below where his ear meets the rest of his head. His hair seems to be expertly adjusted to cover most of the rest of it, which seems to stretch down towards his neck. The idea that it _could_ be a hickey burns its way into the back of his head but is quickly put out at the sight of just how _big_ this thing is.  
Steve just barely speaks before it begins to border on the socially impolite side of pauses. “Right well, it's still like-” He scrunches his face for a second trying to be as nonchalant as possible about knowing the exact amount of miles it would be to campus. “A hundred, give or take, minutes.” When Billy doesn’t respond with anything other than a lopsided smile, the sophomore stumbles out a quiet, “Well in drive time I mean, I’m not sure how long it would be in like walking time or anything.”   
Billy shrugs and kicks an icy rock down the road, “Dunno, could probably use the walking.”   
Steve bites his lip, peeling off a sliver of skin that he’s been picking at since mid-dinner. The cold cuts through that small patch of raw skin for a moment, sending a chill down his arms.   
  


“You could ride back with me, I mean you don’t have to or anything I just-” He blows out a breath as the heat starts to boil into his ears and down towards his clenched hands.   
Billy still doesn’t react other than tilting his head, patiently waiting for Steve to finish his weird rambling.   
“We’re headed the same direction and it's kinda cold out for you to be walking in jeans in the snow.” He stumbles through the last part as quickly as he can. He tries to hide his gasp for air by turning back to the road and pretending the wheel needed adjusting.   
  


“Paying attention to my outfit instead of the road, Harrington?” Billy drawls out, a slight shake to his voice as the cold being mentioned seems to bring it back into the air.   
  


“ _What_ _?!_ No, I just-” His voice hits a pitch he hasn’t had access to since the 5th grade. He moves the wheel slightly and clears his throat.   
  


“You want a ride or not?” This is the bravest Steve’s been in at least a year, or what feels right now like his whole life.   
Billy grunts at this, a small grin peeking from beneath where the scarf has been hastily pulled up in an attempt to gain some body heat. Steve waits for an answer, his left foot wiggling anxiously against the brake pedal.   
  


“I have cookies in the back?” 

It comes out as more of a question, but Billy seems to perk up at this new information.   
  


“What kind?” 

  
  


  
Steve feels like his heads filled with really, _really_ loud bees.

Swarming in and out of his brain as his passenger, his ‘ _Problem_ ’, idly fingers through the cookie options before settling on 98% of the raspberry thumbprint cookies. Which he dumps unceremoniously into the makeshift bucket he’s created with his shirt.

Steve resists the urge to shake his head as Billy rummages through the box one last before seemingly deciding he’s taken all of the good desserts. 

He kicks his snow boots up onto the dash for a moment, his thick, jean-clad-thighs stirring something low in Steve’s stomach that he has to beg not to continue. Steve feels like he has to physically pull his eyes away from his passenger, turning them back to the road wearily.   
Some part of him pangs with the notion that he’d rather crash than miss any of this. But that voice is just as quickly covered by a swarm of “Shut up idiot’’ and “Ew, stop it-” and internal groaning overall.   
As long as he’d been sentient, that damn voice had commented randomly on things he wished he never noticed. Like when the boys on his baseball team wore their uniforms and he silently prayed the games would last forever. Or when he had joined the Hawkins Junior Hockey League for a season and Jeremy Flannigan had body checked him so hard he had to stand by the penalty box for 10 minutes trying to catch his breath. But for some reason he thought about it long after the season was over, his neck and face growing hot during any recounting of it.   
  


He had slowly come to the conclusion that it probably wasn’t the norm to know every detail of the boys he checked out at Scoops, or over at the Family Video Store, but barely be able to remember what DVD they had rented.   
Robin had thrown her eyebrows up when an especially gorgeous recruiter from West Lafayette had come down to rope unsuspecting high school seniors into applying for Purdue University and rendered him verbally useless. His head and something below his stomach still flutter if he tries to recall any of that specific event.   
  


Now it feels like the bees are moving slowly downward, steadily trying to make a fool out of him in his own damn car.   
And it seems like the more he thinks about it the more steady that buzzing, bubbly feeling seems to billow deep down into his core. He strips another chunk of skin off of his lip and stares endlessly into the road ahead and tries not to demand the universe to push Billy’s shirt up just a little higher for him. Or for his passenger to take that damn coat off so he could see the muscles in his arm jump as he raises Joyce’s cookies to his fucking annoyingly perfect lips.   
  


He didn’t even _like_ mustaches and something about Billy made him wake up sweaty in the middle of the night. 

  
“Jesus Harrington it’s like 95 in here-” Billy says angrily as he begins to jerkily throw his arms out from the soft downy fabric of his winter coat.   
  


Steve has to hold his breath to avoid yelling in excitement. And somewhat in fear as he takes in Billy through his peripheral view for what had to have been the 34th time that hour.   
The shirt he’s wearing underneath is one of Steve’s personal favorites.   
He can swear Billy is fighting back a grin as Steve grips the steering wheel until his knuckles turn pasty, but with the amount of effort he’s putting into _not_ getting hard over a _shirt_ , he can’t be too sure of anything.   
The shirt is literally the most boring one in the world, a black t-shirt that is most likely one size too small for its owner. But the way it fits Billy is what knocks Steve out every time.   
It's just tight enough that he can see the black-coated outlines of every muscle group on Billy’s torso. The last time ‘Mr. Hargrove’ wore it to class Steve made the casual decision to stay at the desk until it wasn’t completely inappropriate for him to stand. 

  
“Sorry, I didn’t realize it was that hot- I was kind of cold.” He says unsteadily as he reaches down a clammy hand to turn the dial back into the blue. Billy snorts at this, mutters an ‘ _of course you’re skinny ass would-_ ’ and shoves the second bite of another raspberry thumbprint into his mouth before going back to tracing random shapes into the foggy glass of the window.   
  


Steve fights to keep his hand steady as he tentatively reaches up and presses the knob on the radio. 

  
He lets out a relieved sigh when the song playing doesn’t blast out their eardrums. He clicks the volume up a few notches before he settles back into his seat and waits for the next song to play.   
  


Steve’s so sure that the universe hates him, that when the beginning of ‘ _Sexual Healing_ ’ by Marvin Gaye begins pouring through the speakers, he can’t help but let out a dry chuckle.   
  


Of all the horrible, ironic songs to be playing with the hottest man to ever beat the shit out of Steve sitting within spitting distance of him, _this_ takes the cake. 

They barely get to the chorus before Billy takes a thick, rubber-clad snow boot and presses his heel against the power button until the song cuts out, the radio station being quietly replaced with the time instead. 

“Honest to god, would rather listen to nails on a chalkboard than that trash-” Billy grunts as he shifts back into the leather seat, kicking that same boot-clad foot up onto Steve’s dashboard.

And sparking that same bubbling tingling feeling in the space behind Steve's dick that he has to fight tooth and nail to get rid of.   
  


Steve fails to find any words that wouldn’t come out stuttered and frayed in wake of what he had just leered at. So instead he just stares straight ahead, trying to replay some random episode of Cheers he saw on Joyce’s living room tv earlier that day.   
“You know that Ten Years' Time Essay is due in Grimes’s the day we get back?” Billy drawls out.   
The way he says it makes Steve feel like he’s got something to ask. He waits, focusing on the road and the deep ache spreading across his knuckles. Instead, Billy raises a dark eyebrow up, forming two small creases that point down towards his perfect nose.   
He tries his hardest to avoid the burning eye contact Hargrove’s trying to force.   
  
Something twists in his stomach thinking about looking into Billy’s sky blue eyes.   
Every time he looks at them he feels like he’s standing at the top of a cliff, staring into the horizon.   
  
They remind him of the trip to the peak of Hoosier Hill his parents forced him on back when he was 12. They had still been trying to patch things up. As if family vacations didn’t bring out the worst in the both of them. Some of the worst moments of his life were spent huddled in the backseat of the car, plugging his ears to the screaming.   
  
It had taken way too long to get to the top. He was smothered in sunscreen even though it was overcast, making his skin feel like a sticky summer-soaked mess. He, for the most part, can only remember feeling furious. He had asked if they could just spend spring break at home, or go to Disneyland.   
Instead, his parents had dragged him out to the middle of nowhere to climb a mountain like some pack of athletes. He’d have given anything to be back at the baseball fields throwing the ball around with some of the neighborhood kids.   
It had to have been at least a 3-mile hike to the peak. He was sure of it. His calves were burning, and his Mom was walking so fast that he had to jog just to keep up with her.   
He could be sitting back at the cabin, enjoying the air conditioning and staring out the window.   
  


He hadn’t seen it initially. The view.   
  
He had run face-first into his mother, who had stopped to wait for the others to catch up.   
She had given him a sweat and dirt caked grin and stepped to the side with a sweep of her dainty hand. The memory is laced in gold in his head. The edges like marigold flowers at sunset, curling in and blooming in random spaces in his periphery.   
  
He had never seen a sky that blue before. It was... _beautiful._   
It had taken his whole life to figure out what ‘Pretty as a Picture’ had meant. Like, he had gotten the idea. But this was...different.   
The mountains had risen like sleeping giants in the distance, covered in pure white snow. Like fresh powdered donuts. The trees that coated the mountainsides were green like emeralds, dusted again in that same bright snowfall. 

It wasn’t the best view. And he’s sure it wasn’t winning any awards for Most Scenic View in any fancy travel magazines. 

  
But it was his. 

Just for that moment, the rest of everything felt like an ant at his feet. His parents and their growing hatred of each other meant nothing to the mountains. The trees didn’t care about grades or assignments. 

  
It made everything feel so _quiet_.

Like for just one second of his life, his thoughts weren’t the normal tidal waves they normally were. It was just fine. Everything was fine. Just for a second.   
  


He was terrified of why Billy’s eyes would remind him of the mountains. Steve couldn’t tell what it was, but nothing good could come of it.   
“Shit what’s today?” Steve says, feigning a confused look in the opposite direction.   
Billy snorts and crosses his arms, the muscles stretching the thin black fabric perfectly.   
  
“Think real hard, Harrington.” He says, this time raising both eyebrows as his driver seems to struggle to come up with the obvious answer.   
Steve opens his mouth, racking his brain for some spatial awareness. He can barely remember what he was doing an hour ago, let alone what the date on Joyce’s calendar had said when he’d wandered in to steal food.   
‘ _Wait, Joyce’s house…’_ _  
_ His brows furrow, digging deeper into the bridge of his nose.   
“Oh my god.” He mutters, rolling his eyes as the heat boiling into his face. “It’s Thanksgiving.”   
Billy barely lets him get it out before he chimes in with an overly cheerful, ‘ _There it is!_ ’ and casts a devilish grin in Steve’s direction.   
  
Steve lets out a groan and leans back against the leather seat, wiping an embarrassed hand over his face. Billy’s still chuckling, his sharp canines just barely poking through enough to send Steve’s stomach tumbling down into his spine.   
  
“It's a right, up here Harrington-” Billy had said, sitting up quickly. “Fuck me-” Steve muttered, blinking himself out of his lustful fog for a moment to realize they were going 60 down a 35, with a turn coming up in less than 30 yards.   
He brakes, flashing a quick eye up to the rearview mirror to check that he wasn’t brake-checking some poor driver behind him. The bend in the road is still coming way too fast.   
“Shit shit shit!” He yells through his teeth, moving his right hand to the top of the wheel.   
“We can just turn arou-” The rest of Billy’s sentence is cut off with a yell of terror as Steve pistol-whips the wheel towards the blonde’s knees and throws a boney arm into his chest. 

There’s no real reason to have taken that turn in the first place.   
There was another outlet 35 feet down the way.   
But hey, hindsight’s 20/20.   
  
They make it.   
Billy’s screaming is filling Steve’s head as the adrenaline spreads its fingers into his face and opens a wide grin that makes his eyes squish under the pressure of his cheeks.   
He could feel his passenger’s heartbeat through the hand he’s unintentionally pressed into his chest.   
Or that could just be his. 

Nothing is covering up the silent drumming of his brain relishing in the pure terror of the car leaning more than it ever has as the round the final quarter of the bend.   
Billy’s knuckles are whiter than his as his bruised fingers find their way around the hand above the window, his other hand grabbing desperately at Steve’s wrist.   
When they finally straighten out onto the street billowing swiftly into the distance, he can begin to hear the choked sounds of Billy trying to slow his heart rate down. He’s gripping at Steve’s wrist like it's the only thing keeping his heart from giving out entirely. 

A laugh bobs at the tip of his tongue.   
He tries his hardest to keep it down, honestly. 

  
But the sight of Billy panting as his pinpoint pupils dart around their surroundings makes something in Steve’s brain split in half like an old floorboard.   
That grin breaks and there’s a heart pouring against the edges of his eyes as he fights to keep them open over the giggles bouncing against the car’s interior.   
Billy seems to finally pull away with enough consciousness to glare at his upper-classman, the anger, and pure shock icing away any endearment that would have been there.   
  
“Holy shit-” Steve manages to choke out, he’s gripping at the ends of his sweater, grasping at any coherency he can find to try and explain why his shit brain is making him do this. He gasps, the peels of laughter finding their reprieve for just a moment, only to gain new kindling.   
He can barely see the road, tears warping the surface like his own two personal oceans.

His face hurts. 

His stomach hurts.   
So do his lungs. 

  
He can’t seem to get himself to calm down now, the fear and adrenaline holding his body hostage. He grips at the buttons closest to his chest and he can almost feel the heartbeat through the knitted fabric. He just barely manages to pull into the parking lot next to the dorms before his feeble effort to keep his laughter under control breaks entirely.   
“I-” He gasps again, the words coming out sounding far too close to sobbing for Steve’s comfort.   
“I’m _so_ fucking stupid-” The ‘ _oh my god_ ’ following it up as if he’s astounded by this information he’s known since 7th grade.   
Steve’s shoving his head into his hands, trying to stifle the laughter in any way he can think of.   
  
The huffy laugh that passes through Billy’s perfect lips is followed sequentially by the most annoyingly perfect giggling he’s ever heard. It doesn’t fit him at all.   
It doesn’t remind him of a cold porcelain plate smashing into the back of his skull, or the feeling of thick, heavy thighs forcing him to the ground.   
It doesn’t remind him of watching helplessly from a random spot in StarCourt Mall as Max screamed Billy’s name and El lay motionless on the floor. It doesn’t remind him of his heart hitting the back of his throat as he felt every little moment he had spent hoping Billy would notice him at the pool that summer shatters to pieces like the tall glass windows surrounding them.   
It doesn’t remind him of the nights he spent with every lamp he could sneak away with sitting in his room, as images of Billy’s chest being pierced echoing around his frayed head.   
  
This is light incarnate. It reminds him of 1st grade inside jokes that didn’t make any sense. Of chasing each other on the playground during recess.   
Of dunking friends under the water at the public pool, or outflanking a teammate during a scrimmage in basketball. 

It sounds like wicked grins and wrinkled noses. Like freckles and the smell of the ground just after it rained. Billy’s laugh made something in his skin light up like the summer sun was high in the sky, bearing down on him as the waves crashed in the distance.  
Steve’s uncontrollable laughter lasts for about 30 seconds after that, before the two of them fade into sniffles and small aftershock giggles.   
Billy covers his mouth, blocking Steve from that perfectly soft and simultaneously sharp smile.   
Steve is scrubbing at his eyes, trying to dry his wet eyelashes and the soft skin under his eyes with the cuffs of his sleeves. 

  
“Jesus Harrington, you tryna kill me a second time?” Billy grins, lopsided and sharp. It makes Steve’s arms feel weak like he’s slept on them for too long. He can feel a smile of his own tugging eagerly at the left corner of his mouth.   
“Oh my god, Hargrove I don’t think I could even if I wanted to!” He tosses his hands in the air, taking note of how boisterous Billy’s laughing became with that comment.   
“Christ man, I t-boned your car and you walked it off like you’d just body-checked a post player during a game!”   
Billy snorts. 

It's the gasping kind, his laughter high and keening, closer to whine than to a real laugh. His cheeks are pulled up, squishing his long, dark eyelashes against his strong brow bones in a way that has Steve’s head spinning. His nose is wrinkled and smushed in between his thumb and pointer finger as Billy tries to keep himself at bay. The snort breaks through the pink slots in his fingertips and stabs Steve through the chest like a knife.   
  
He’s gripping the wrinkled fabric that's bunched at his knees, trying to resist pushing into Billy’s personal space just to get a better view.   
“Yeah, believe me, if I remembered any of that, I’m sure I would be able to brag about my ungodly stamina better.” Billy giggles out, leaning back into the seat- pressing his perfect back into the leather with a flutter in Steve’s stomach.   
“All I got was a body covered in scars and a bunch of brats attached at my hip every chance they get.” He motions to pale white skin peeking out of the top of the black shirt with a dismissive wave of his hand.   
It’s an interesting moment, in Steve’s head, to watch Billy display his coping mechanisms. He’s met this entire scenario like he meets everything, with disdain. Steve’s not sure if it's the weird voice in his head talking but, he wants so desperately to cut into the different layers of Billy, just so he can reach what the lifeguard _doesn’t_ hate.   
“The Party actually talks to you?”   
Billy scoffs, rolling his eyes and shifting his hips forward. That space just below Steve’s stomach pulls tight again with a tingling sensation shooting up his spine that leaves him inhaling sharply.   
“Talks _at_ me is more like it. Those little jerks have asked me more questions than the Feds about the ‘Mind-Racer’ or whatever they are callin’ it.” He twists a calloused hand outward, conveying his mild frustration in the most mundane way possible. Steve’s smile quirks a little.   
“Mind-Flayer-” He turns his eyes away, avoiding the withering glare the other casts at him as he follows it up with an ‘ _I think- is what they called it, I mean_ .’   
  
“Yeah, yeah whatever-” He says, that smile still breaking his normally sharp features into something far more soft. More approachable, more-   
_No_. 

Steve internally tries to cover his ears as detailed images of Billy’s lips flash in his head. Some of them are from moments during the fight, the one’s Steve can kind of remember. And some of them are newer. Kissing the soft pink blush on Billy’s face that only the Indiana cold could pull out of the surfer’s tanned skin. Tracing the small patches of freckles along the tops of Billy’s cheeks, just under his eyes where his dark eyelashes end. Pressing a gentle hand onto the scar on the back of Billy’s neck, feeling every bump and shiny segment of the surgical scar on his chest. The one that healed a pale purple-pink against the sea of white scar tissue.   
  
“So when that thing-” He stutters. He’s not sure what part of his brain cropped this question up, but he’s now too deep to pull away. He rolls his hand, hoping to kickstart his mouth into working again. “ _Did that_ to you-” He blinks hard, rubbing the pads of his thumbs against the sides of his index fingers.   
“Are the-” He stutters again, huffing and closing his eyes. He takes a deep breath and lets it out through his nose as annoyance furrows his brow. “So it left scars?”   
He’s almost so proud of himself for getting through his question without giving up that he forgets Billy has actually been observing him.   
He turns back to make eye contact with those sky blues again and his stomach flips.   
There’s a fleeting, warm smile on the blonde's face that makes that space in Steve’s hips pull tighter against his spine. He squeezes his thighs shut as casually as he can.   
“Why, Harrington? You hopin’ to sneak a peek or something.”   
  


Steve could vomit. Really. He’d rather be leaned over his on-suite toilet in his parents' house after a bad rager than be sitting in this car, reeling at the flirtatious bite Billy Hargrove just dished out onto him.   
His eyes go wide, the burning oil in his veins bursting and racing to his face and neck with a new aggression. “What no I-” He squeaks, his brain blanking on anything other than the fleeting hope that Billy wasn’t just trying to get a rise out of him. That some part of him was serious.   
A dark eyebrow quirks and he can hear a huffy exhale as Billy seems to silently relish in making the brunette squirm in his seat.   
“I just-” He runs a hand against the back of his neck and loosens his aching knuckles from the wheel, letting the slow pain pulsing against the tendons ease itself away.   
“Nobody else left- _it_ -” He waves a stiff hand into the distance outside of the car as if the word ‘it’ can possibly cover everything that had happened on that terrifying day back in July. “Like- like me.” The end of his sentence falters with the last of his confidence as a thought flashes in the back of his head.   
The single scar on him is literally nothing compared to what he watched Billy take.   
Clipped and shattered pieces of that moment break through the skin of his head. The large fleshy extensions of that monster piercing through the white t-shirt fabric.   
Deep black sludge pulsing through the beaten and angered veins. Billy’s final scream, the one that still plays in the back of his head like a shitty recording echoes against his ears in a perfect recreation that would bring anyone else to their knees.   
Instead, he blinks and it’s gone.   
It’s taken this long to get to the point where day to day things didn’t remind him. Where the fancy china dishware collecting dust in his mother’s window-pane cabinet didn’t pull that anguished scream back up like a tornado siren in the dead of the night.   
He doesn’t like spiders, not that he ever did, but especially not now. Nothing with more than four legs, and even then- four legs is pushing it.   
  
Steve clears his throat and pulls the sleeve of his sweater down, it's careful out of habit. Too many nights hiding it from his parents at forced family dinners where the scabs snagged against the heavy rim of a sweatshirt or a jacket sleeve has created a cautious man out of him.   
That and several other underlying factors.   
  
A long, uneven scar runs from the meat of his palm, right under the beginning of his thumb, around the dip where his wrist meets his hand, and stops randomly a few inches into the pale skin of his forearm.   
Billy’s leaning over, too close. Steve can feel the ghost of a breath on the top of his shoulder that sends a shiver up his back. A large, calloused index finger comes into Steve’s view before it’s carefully tracing the scar’s path, a few centimeters to the side. The other is cupping over the other side, steadying the appendage so Billy can get a better view.

His breath catches.   
He can feel his heart hammering into his sternum, it’s a terrifyingly new and exhilarating sensation.   
“Did that thing get you too or-” Billy murmurs, his voice low like they are standing in the back of a church during mass. His eyebrows are digging into his face again, two lines forming perpendicular to the curve of his forehead. As if frowning will solve the invisible riddle on Steve’s skin.   
“No, no I uh.” He can barely focus on what words are coming out in what order. All his brain can do is send alarm after alarm about the skin Billy’s lighting up like fireflies in the dark of the night. He can almost feel the soft, curly blonde hair against his neck. The dark t-shirt and the chest underneath it pressed into his back, those strong Teflon arms wrapped around his shoulders.   
He lets out a huffy laugh, internally cringing at how damn nervous it sounded as it tumbled into the air.   
“Some Russian soldier in the lab got a little ballsy with a switchblade after they drugged us.” Billy’s hand slows at the bottom, right where the scar curves and falls away like a horribly botched checkmark. “Fuck, Harrington-” He breathes, his hand wobbling with the force of it.   
Steve can feel Billy’s words shoot straight into his hips, sparking that bubbling tingling feeling to draw his spine in tight. A tremble rocks into his shoulder before he can stop it.   
Billy moves in what feels like slow motion, bringing the pad of his finger press it gently into the uneven surface on his forearm.   
“This is a huge cut, Harrington- did you need stitches or anything?” Billy’s eyebrows are titled up, making Steve’s chest string itself tighter. His breath feels like a stone in his throat, making him hyper-aware of the sudden struggle to keep any air in his system.   
He shakes his head, making fleeting eye contact with the stark sky blue eyes across from him before turning away. "I didn't tell anyone." 

Billy's hand freezes, the pad of his pointer finger sending all of Steve's arm hair standing on end. 

Steve shrugs away the astonishingly worried gaze his classmate is giving him and turns his face even farther away. 

"As soon as the Feds and everyone arrived-" He mutters the _'I don't know I just..._ ' and lets it hang there. 

He's never had to actually _explain_ to anyone before. But as he glanced sheepishly back at Billy, he can tell that his passenger is waiting in silent worry for him to continue. 

He shifts back in his seat, terribly aware that Billy hasn't released his wrist. 

He doesn't know _how_ to explain this properly.

Steve tilts his head back so he's staring at the ceiling, hoping the new angle may help him form better sentences, like tilting an empty soda can to get the tab out. 

"I knew they'd _ask_ and I just-" he stops to swallow, trying to keep that sour taste from making his eyes water. He shakes his head again, closing his eyes as a tired sigh tries to claw its way out of his throat. 

"I didn't wanna talk to anyone. I _didn_ ' _t_ talk to anyone." 

"Talk about what?" 

He grimaces.

The question is so patient, and _soft_ that he feels like Joyce's homemade Thanksgiving meal may make a comeback. 

His heart is running a mile a minute but he feels like his head is swimming in a lake made of honey. He feels like he's drowning in sugar but he can't get himself to just stand up. It wraps it's perfect, Billy-shaped arms around his waist and whispers something kind and gentle into the crook of his neck, and drags him in deeper. A part of him yells and thrashes and cries out in a panic. But some part of him wants this- _needs_ this. He needs Billy the way the sun needs the sky. 

The way a horizon needs the ground. 

The way the mountains need the trees. 

But he knew. 

Billy reminded him of the mountains because of what he didn't want to admit. 

He had _loved_ the mountains. Adored them, unwaveringly. 

But he knew the mountains would never love him back. 

"You." 


End file.
